


Daisies from the Sidewalk

by MsModernity



Category: Crash Pad (2017), Girls (TV), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Kylux adjacent pairing, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-24
Updated: 2019-04-24
Packaged: 2020-01-25 17:46:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18579469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MsModernity/pseuds/MsModernity
Summary: Stensland talks too much. Sackler, not enough. It worked for a while, until it didn’t. But maybe it can again?





	Daisies from the Sidewalk

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fic so please be kind

At nearly 30 years old, Stensland O’Maoldhomhnaigh was finally settling into a new groove, in the wake of his disastrous love triangle with Morgan and Grady. He’d escaped with his pride mostly in tact, and made a good friend in Hannah. 

Grady had offered to pay Stensland’s rent until the end of the year and Morgan had let him refurnish her impersonal living room with a fun mix of deep tones, soft fabrics and contrasting textures in a cooler color palette. She only returned two of the throw pillows and one lamp he’d picked. His bank account actually hit the four-digit mark, a milestone, with his commission from her sale.

This was the first time that the sometimes scattered redhead had ever held on to a job he didn’t actively hate. He spent his shifts helping customers find their perfect mix of comfortable and contemporary furniture and decor to turn their houses into homes. He liked looking at what his clients wore or how they behaved to get a sense of how they wanted to live. Was she wearing a cute pair of espadrilles? Maybe something from the new Hamptons Summer collection, full of sisal and lightweight fabrics. Mister Three Piece Suit was more likely to feel at home in a fine leather wingback chair in deep cognac with Chippendale stylings.

Speaking of cognac, Stensland was cutting back on that as well. No more binge drinking. Just an occasional cocktail or three with the ladies at the corner jazz club or Hannah and her friends from spin class. He’d even scaled back his weed budget to what he considered responsible adult levels. He’d gotten rid of all but his two favorite bongs, and used one of them to hold fresh flowers instead. Yes, the tall and lanky Pisces had finally found a pond he could really swim in and spread his fins. Perhaps he was kidding himself thinking he could ever be a condor. But this was enough.

The lifestyle upgrade was certainly welcomed. For a while there, Seattle wasn’t fitting Stensland any better than his last residence... Brooklyn. Of course, he never _really_ quite fit in anywhere. Not even the small Irish town where he was born. After his mother died during his secondary-school years, that village stopped being any kind of home. And even if they stared sometimes, at least folks in the Emerald City never shunned his white-suited disco dancing the way the people of the Emerald Isle once did.

Of course, the weather here suits him. The overcast sky and light mist, keeping him from overheating on his walk home from Soft Solutions. He decides to reward himself for selling three sofas and a recliner today by ducking inside his favorite coffee house to buy a strawberry milk and a scone. As he walks past the bulletin board just to the left of the potted plant that’s drooping because it _doesn’t_ like the weather here the way Stensland does, he spots a flyer that makes him look twice.

The touring company of a Broadway show is coming to town next week. Normally, Stensland isn’t one for live theater. He feels funny being able to see the actors so close up, seeing the tape on the floor, the fraying spots in their costumes. It lacks the same gauzy perfection of his favorite movies or television shows. You’d never see Dawson with a scuff on his shoe. Still, the flyer for the play calls to him. A face in the cast photo looks familiar. Could it really be? Adam Sackler, coming to his doorstep?

For a brief moment, Stensland lets the unbridled romantic in him take over. It feels like fate, so he buys a ticket. 

Now it’s one week later and he might have scaled back his weed habit, but he still tokes up a little before the show. It’s live theater after all! But at least this time there’s something to hold his interest, he hopes. If he hadn’t been hallucinating about the face on the flyer. He hasn’t hallucinated in months.

The play is only in town for three days. Stensland got his ticket for the first showing. He isn’t even really sure why he felt the need to come, but a sight on his way to the theater reassured him the gods must be happy. So now here he sits, clutching a handful of flowers he found growing along the curb on the way to the venue. He didn’t even think that kind of flower grew here in Seattle. He hadn’t seen them since Brooklyn. Orange and wilting, they’re just bunched together and wrapped in a rubber band that the concession lady gave him. An offering to the fates.

He picked a spot five rows back from the stage. The chair is comfy, at least. That helps him settle his tummy. That, and the giant cinnamon roll he scarfed down in the lobby.

The curtain goes up, and there he is! Wow. He’s been working out. Adam looks a lot bigger since the last time he laid eyes on the tall raven-haired man. Sackler was always broad-shouldered, but now he looks like he could take out the Sea Hawks’ front line. Or something. Stensland is still worthless about American “football.” Adam’s voice is deep, but his character quickly leaves the stage, taking Stensland’s interest with him.

The theater is small so the stage lights cast their glow on quite a bit of the audience. Stensland finds the lights distracting, making it even harder for him to keep focus. He doesn’t make it through the scene.

He doesn’t catch that Adam is now delivering a big soliloquy. The actor is delivering his lines with a manic intensity when he catches a shock of ginger out of the corner of his eye. It’s a very specific shade. His nearly skips his line. 

Adam can’t help but look. He’s so relieved when another actor enters the stage, so he can finally sneak a glance. And then another. And another. What does he see? A poof of tangly ginger locks, just above the seat back. He can’t believe it. It’s Stensland. And... he’s asleep. 

“Ahem...”

“...”

“Ahem...”

Oh shit, it’s Adam’s line!!! A murmur from the audience and then a light cough. Fuck. He needs to refocus. He needs to make it through the play. He does his best to push that red hair to the back of his mind. The show must go on, and so it does.

It wasn’t a terrible performance, really. Better than the disaster in New Hampshire. Not as bad as the rough night in Baton Rouge. Not nearly as good as Denver, but he’s pretty sure that entire audience was high and suffering from long term oxygen deprivation. But as soon as the velvet comes back down, Sackler can only think of one thing.

When Adam peeks out from behind the curtain, Stensland is still asleep. The audience is shuffling around him. The house lights are up. He makes his way into the row and finds Stensland hunkered down in his seat. What’s that in his hands? They look like those orange daisies Adam would sometimes pluck for him when he’d walk over to Stensland’s place for a quick fuck. They’re the kind that sometimes pop up along the curb between the cracks in Brooklyn. Their color reminded him of Stensland’s hair.

When Adam gets his fill of looking at the sweet pink lips and nearly colorless lashes on that pale face, slack in slumber, he nudges him. Sackler’s knee touching Stensland’s. 

The redhead stirs awake, wipes the drool away from his mouth, and finally looks up. But he finds the house lights are being blocked by a mountain of a man.

“... Hullo.”

“Hey, Stens.”

Bright green eyes crinkle up at the corners. Those perfectly straight teeth peek out as he smiles, “Oh! These are for y—“

Suddenly he’s scooped up.

After a bone-crushing hug that seems to go on the entire length of a commercial break, Adam hefts Stensland over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and walks through the lobby and out of the theater. He doesn’t even know where he’s going or where his hotel is. He’s just walking.

“Where are you taking me?”

“I have no idea.”

“Well... my bus stop is coming up on the left.”

“Okay.”

Sackler doesn’t put him down until the bus pulls up. Stensland doesn’t complain. Once Stensland pays their fare, they sit side by side, pressed together at the hip but they don’t talk. It seems they’re both unsure of what to say. The wrong word might break the magic that the gods conjured up.

When they get to Stensland’s stop, he stands and hopes Adam will do the same. Suddenly he feels a blanket of warmth as Sackler crowds up against his back. He’s missed this so much. 

They exit without a word. The driver just smiles and shakes her head. Good for you, little condor, she thinks. She’s seen Stensland dozens of times before. Sometimes weeping for the entirety of his ride. But not lately. In fact, he’d been a real chatterbox for the last several weeks. But he was quiet tonight. So was the man who’s now following him through the lobby door of the McTavish apartment building.

Once they make their way inside the apartment, Stensland flicks on the overhead light, yellowed by the mica shade. He takes off his jacket, hangs it on a hook, then turns around and braces himself.

“I suppose we should talk first...”

“Nope. Not first,” Adam says as he takes Stensland’s face between his hands and plants a wet sloppy kiss on those perfect pink lips. Sackler still kisses like he’s drowning. Like his lips and tongue could possibly find their way to a crevice and hang on so the waves won’t pull him under. His hands feel enormous against Stensland’s cheeks. His fingers, spanning toward the back of his head.

Once Stensland’s lips feel properly bruised, he pulls back and places his pale hand on Sackler’s sizable chest. 

“Wait.”

“You’re always talking too much,” Adam mumbles between attacks of his wet mouth. He’s now got Stensland pinned against the back of his couch. It would be so easy for Stensland to just let go and enjoy the ride. But he shouldn’t.

“And you never talked enoof! But we need ta,” he manages to get out even as his own fingers surge into Adam’s slightly greasy hair.

Adam sighs. “I know.” He scrubs his hand over his face and looks around. “Nice place.” He actually means it. There are fresh flowers on the counter. Huh, he remembers that old chest in front of the sofa. The rest of the furniture looks new. Is that a painting of a pirate ship?

“You uh... live here alone?”

“Yeah, ever since Gray-dee moved out. He’s put me up here ‘til the end of the year.”

Sackler’s chest clenches, but he says nothing. Just bites on the inside of his bottom lip. He doesn’t really want to have this conversation. He wants to fuck Stensland deep into the chenille of his couch. He wants to erase the last couple of years. Of Hannah, of Jess. But they helped bring him to this point, he supposes.

After a few more beats of awkward silence, Adam finally manages, “Is... is that why you left?” He can’t quite look at those green eyes right now.

“What?”

“...Grady.”

“Fook, no! Wasn’t loike that! Not really with Morgan either.”

“Who?”

“Nobodee. Just... Nevermoind...”

Nevermind? The fuck? No, he’s not going to nevermind. That’s not happening. He doesn’t say so with words, but he hopes his clenched jaw and intense stare convey it. They’ve worked for him on stage before. It seems to work here, too.

“Yeah, so... why I left...”

Silence takes over once again, but he can hear what is probably a sink faucet dripping in the next room. If they’re not fucking, Sackler has no plan to break the tension.

“Y’know New York never agreed wit’ me. I couldn’t even foind a job.”

“Yeah, well... it’s hard to find work when you’re laying around stoned all day,” Adam snaps. He didn’t mean to say that. But it’s true. “So, what? You came out west for the legal weed?”

“No. Well, koinda. But no.”

“So?... What was it?”

“I didn’t know if there was anything there for me.”

“The FUCK is that supposed to mean?” Sackler scoffs. Like he was nothing?

Stensland just shakes his head as he moves over to sit on the sofa and pulls a pillow to his lap. He’s sniffling already. Fuck. A pale hand rakes through the ginger mop on his head.

“When did you realize I was gone?”

“What???”

“...”

Shit, it had been years ago. He hated thinking about it. About how it felt when he walked into his shitty little stale-smelling apartment. He’d forgotten to take out the trash. He found that note on the ground near the door the next day. After he’d already gone to Stensland’s rented room and found that stupid chest of VCR cassettes gone. 

“I guess... When I got back from upstate? That stupid ass theater workshop.”

“Exactlee. You were gone for ten days. Y’never even called.”

“Called for what, phone sex?”

“No!!! I wanted... Fook, nevermoind.”

“NO! Tell me!!! The fuck was I s’posed to call about??? It was boring as shit! My reception was fucked. I got mosquito bites all over me. There was never enough food. I hated it. What the fuck would I have to say about that??? I sure as shit didn’t expect to find you skipped town when I got back. Your fucking land lord said you hadn’t paid rent for like two months.”

Sackler feels like he’s about to pop out of his skin. This is why he didn’t want to talk about this. He just wants to move on. Move past it. They’re both here now. Fuck whatever happened before. They weren’t serious. They were having a good time. Not that he was having a good time with anybody else. But whatever. He thought they had some more time. Or at least that he’d get a fucking goodbye.

His chest is heaving. He needs to calm the fuck down.

“Did you... did you miss me?” Stensland asks quietly. Whispers, practically.

Adam feels his rage start to melt away. That quiet voice always did that to him. The whispering. The little ear touches. The tickling on his cheek from those goddamn blond eyelashes. Stensland always quieted him, right up until he’d complain that Adam was _too_ quiet.

“Come on, kid. ‘Course I did.” That much would be okay, right?

“You never said it. I waited. Fer foive days. I was goin’ out of my fookin’ moind and you didn’t call fer foive days.”

“So you left.”

“So I left.”

The dripping of the faucet again. If Adam had his tools here, he’d fix that. He’s pretty good with his hands. But wait. That’s not the faucet after all. It’s rain drops on the window glass. Must be single pane in an older building like this. But it’s cozy enough in this room. The couch is long. Long enough for a six-foot tall man to stretch out. Or maybe two men. It was deep enough. His mind is wandering, isn’t it?

Adam finally grins a little and says, “That’s the dumbest fucking shit I’ve ever heard.”

“Yeah well...”

Sackler bites his inner lip again. He knows he needs to say a little more. Stensland was always filling the space between them with endless words full of nothing, but now he’s quiet. 

“Yeah, I missed you. Of course I missed you, Stensland. The fuck do you think? I still... fuckin’ miss you. You’re sitting right here and I still fuckin’ miss you.”

A sniffle, and then... “I missed you, too.”

Sackler lifts his hand and then tentatively hooks his pinky around Stensland’s. It looks enormous in comparison. He’s always liked that.

Adam clears his throat. “You came tonight.”

“What?”

“To the show. You came.”

Stensland’s shoulders heave once.

“Yeah.”

“With flowers.”

“Yeah.”

Adam’s head is ducked low, so he looks up through his lashes at the boy who cut him to the quick when he disappeared. The one he didn’t realize was everything. Until he was gone.

“Why?”

“‘Cause I’m a roight idiot, I guess?”

“Yeah?” Sackler can’t help but smile.

“Yeah. But I had ta. Fate brought you to me. What could I do? Ya don’t loightly anger the gods by ignoring their soigns, roight?”

“Roight,” Adam says with a grin. He knows he does a terrible Irish accent.

Stensland’s nose has been running. Now his eyes are leaking too. He’s a fucking mess. Sackler lifts the front of his t-shirt, exposing his abs. 

“Blow.”

“What???”

“Your nose. Blow.”

Stensland blows into Sackler’s shirt. Somehow Adam manages to peel it off without covering himself with snot. Another minor miracle from the gods.

It’s disgusting, but Adam acts like it’s no big deal. It starts to dawn on Stensland, now that his high has worn off completely, that this is how Adam’s always been.

He thinks back to that hot and humid summer. The way Adam was always stashing his leftovers or stuff his grandma cooked in Stensland’s mini fridge even though he never ate them. Making sure to leave his abundant pocket change scattered on the Dawson treasure chest just in time for laundry day. Once, Adam even went to Red Hook to pick up some weed for him even though he didn’t smoke himself.

Adam may not have ever said what Stensland wanted to hear, but... God! How is it that he’s always talking but he never asks the right questions? Maybe if Stensland had waited until Adam had gotten back from that workshop instead of leaving town in a snit. Of course, when he was tossed from his room he didn’t exactly have a lot of options. Especially with Adam out of town. Not that he would have asked to stay with him. That would’ve been too much, too soon. Or so he had thought back then.

“I tought... I didn’t understand... shit.” He’s shaking now.

“Hey. Hey, look at me. You here?”

Thick fingers start carding through bright ginger strands. They sit, quiet again. Now they’re pressed nose to nose.

“Yeah... yeah. For the first toime in a long toime, I think...”

Stensland leans his whole body toward Adam, burying his face into the man’s neck. It’s warm, as always. He was always so goddamn warm. Like a radiator. It’s strange how familiar smells can bring you back to the past so clearly. Right now, in the crook of Adam’s neck, the smell of his sweaty skin brings him right back to that summer. He’s finally jolted from his reverie when a pair of massive arms wrap around him.

“I’m in town for three more nights.”

“And then what?” Stensland asks, even though he’s afraid of the answer. Maybe he’s learning. He’s just going to start asking. So what if he doesn’t like the answer.

“Then?... Then Portland, San Francisco, Fresno for some fuckin’ reason, L.A. and we end up in San Diego, I think?”

“And then?”

“And then? I don’t fuckin’ know. Can we figure that part out after?”

“After?”

A breath. A warm hand moving down his arm. Thick lips against his neck. The press of a wet tongue behind his ear.

“Yeah. After.” 

“Yeah... Yeah, okay.”

Sackler licks Stensland’s bottom lip, then bites at it and pulls, drawing a whimper out of the redhead. He had forgotten how forceful Adam could be. No, that’s a lie. He’d never forget this. 

Suddenly he’s heaved up again, this time by the thighs so all he can do is wrap his arms around Adam’s neck, his legs around his hips, and they’re off.

“Which room is yours? I’m not fucking you in Grady’s bed.”

Stensland has to chuckle. “That one.”

Sackler tosses him onto the mattress and then completely covers him with his much larger body. He licks, nibbles, bites. Stensland gets lost in it. It’s been so long.

They’ll get to talking. Eventually. In the morning. Yeah, definitely. In the morning.

—————————

Stensland may have found his groove in Seattle, but nowadays it feels like something is missing. Still, it’s not like he can just skip town. He’s 30 years old now! He finally has a steady job for the first time in his life, and he’s got free rent until the end of the year. He’d be an idiot to give that up. He’s being responsible, thank you very much. And Sackler’s still touring for a bit.

But the difference is they’re talking now— not just phone sex! But there is phone sex. Of course they’re sexting too. And Skyping (which usually turns into sex as well). But they’re really talking. About feelings. About plans. About the new Soft Solutions store opening in Queens later this year.

But for all if their talking. Stensland is still waiting for some very specific words before he’ll entertain the notion of moving back to the snow. He appreciates all of Adam’s gestures for what they are, but he’s a romantic, after all. 

Fortunately, it comes about three months into their long-distance romance redux, as Sackler is trying to talk Stens into applying for the Queens store.

“Come on, kid. New York needs you back!”

“Hmm...”

“Think about it. We could fuck every night! It could be _my_ hand on your dick.”

“...”

Stensland is getting better with the silences, just as Sackler is getting better with the talking.

“And... that’d be cool because... my hand... loves your dick.”

“...”

“Fuck. And I love you, okay? That’s pretty obvious but whatever. I love you.”

“It’s about fooking toime! I loove you too, idiot. I applied for the job yesterday.”

Sackler chuckles like it’s no big deal, but inside his heart is soaring. He’s clenching and unclenching the hand that isn’t holding his phone. He’s grinning. He might be crying.

————————

Late summer rolls around and Stensland is shocked to discover that his regional director actually recommended him for the assistant manager post in New York. He got it. Now the question is, where will he live?

Adam’s grandma had gotten sick so he moved in with her after the tour ended. But she says she doesn’t want that to be a permanent arrangement. He’s got his own life to live. And he’s getting steadier commercial work these days. He even has a Law & Order appearance under his belt, a rite of passage for a New York actor.

He’s still hoping to get into that artist co-op, where they only want married couples. He mentions this to Stensland. The Irish expat doesn’t know how to feel about this. He doesn’t want a snooty co-op board to be the reason they do this. It’s too soon anyway. And it’s too grand of a gesture not to be accompanied by the appropriate conversation. But maybe they could start that talk?

“Is that the only reason? The co-op?”

“What do you mean?”

“Adam.”

“No... No, that’s not the only reason.”


End file.
